Nigeria

Bribery video allegation: Court frees Ganduje from investigation

Monday, December 16, 2019 at 9:29 PM by Khadijah Thabit

- A Federal High Court sitting in Kano has delivered judgement in favour of Governor Abdullahi Umar Ganduje over an alleged bribery video

- The court says the suit filed by a rights activist, Audu Bulama-Bukarti, lacks competence

- According to the court, there is no evidence that the EFCC has a report on the investigation of the allegation against the governor

A suit seeking the investigation of Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, governor of Kano, over allegations that he received bribe as portrayed in a series of videos, has been dismissed by a Federal High Court sitting in Kano.

The court delivered the judgement on Monday, December 16, throwing out the suit brought by Audu Bulama-Bukarti, a lawyer based in the state.

Bulama-Bukarti had wanted the court to order the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) to provide the report of its forensic investigation into the allegations against the governor.

The Nation reports that the court threw the case away for lacking evidence.

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In the ruling, the court explained that the Freedom of Information (FOI) act 2011 stipulates that such details requested must be public records.

The court said it was moved to throw out the case because the evidence before it does not prove that the EFCC has any record of a forensic investigation into the alleged bribery video.

Legit.ng had reported how Bulama-Bukarti had demanded the certified true copies of the videos showing Abdullahi Ganduje allegedly receiving a bribe.

Bulama-Bukarti had made the demand in a letter to the acting chairman of the EFCC, Ibrahim Magu.

Bribery video allegation: Court frees Ganduje from investigation — With the court ruling, Governor Ganduje has nothing more to worry about the video.
Source: Facebook

The lawyer had also given the commission seven-day ultimatum to make the copies available to him or face legal action.

Recall that in 2018, a scandalous video had been published, appearing to show the governor pocketing vast wads of American dollars. Ganduje was accused of collecting bribe from public works contractors.

The governor has since debunked the video as “cloned” and threatened a sweeping lawsuit against its publisher.